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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/28953669">The Streets of Paris</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/rumpledspinster/pseuds/rumpledspinster'>rumpledspinster</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Once Upon a Time (TV)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Cemetery, F/M, Fight Scene, French Revolution, narrow escape, spooky elements</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2021-01-24</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-01-24</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-13 05:34:37</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Graphic Depictions Of Violence</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>6</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>8,445</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/28953669</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/rumpledspinster/pseuds/rumpledspinster</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>A Rumbelle AU set in Revolutionary France. Fights, narrow escapes, intrigue, a vendetta... all set in Paris under the shadow of the Guillotine.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Belle/Rumplestiltskin | Mr. Gold</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>2</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>8</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. Vendémiaire</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>I’d love feedback for how to improve this story. I feel it’s not quite as good as it could be. Perhaps more domestic scenes? More action?</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p class="Body">October 1793</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">The cobblestone street seemed to glow eerily as the lamp light reflected on the wet stone. The evening rain came sifting through the bare branches of the tree lined boulevard throughly soaking Mordecai Gold as he made his way onto the Rue des Fenêtres.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">Finding himself now downwind of the storm, he bent his head down and covered his eyes as best he could with his hand hurrying toward his lodgings, eager for their warmth and quiet. Mordecai huffed in tired frustration as he hurriedly walked along.</p><p class="Body"><br/>
Paris in October, or Vendémiaire as the mandated Revolutionary calendar had renamed it, had been wearing on him heavily. The gloomy skies and lonely nights alone would’ve been enough to make him homesick for Massachusetts, but the sickening nature of the atmosphere of the city gnawed at his psyche and depressed him to no end.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body"> The guillotine had been busy today.</p><p class="Body"><br/>
That morning as he had made his way from his lodgings to the trading bureau by the waterfront where he did his work, eight tumbrils had come bumping heavily across the filthy street on their way to the scaffold set up in the Place de la Revolution, and the jostling, screaming, cursing, animalistic crowd had caught him up and carried him like the strong current of a river right to the line of civil guards that stood sentry around the place of execution. The sight was sickening, but he found he could not look away. Though he desperately wished to shut his eyes tightly or to cover them with his hands, he found he could not.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">Gaston “Monsieur de Paris” was in charge of the grisly spectacle. His crew of valets in their crimson cloaks loaded victim after victim into the dreaded chopper. A slapping knock was heard as the victim hit the long plank, a dull clap of wood on wood as the neck piece was adjusted, and then the swish and dull thud that sounded as the chopper fell. The sounds repeated like the ticking of a monstrous clock counting down the deaths of the captured, each death symbolically pushing them all toward some unimaginable future crescendo.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">Fifty-six victims had been strapped face down to the plank, their necks latched in the pillory, and the dreaded blade had chopped off their heads. Fifty-six heads filled the large baskets, and a pile of twitching corpses with gapping necks became a source of cascading blood running between the cobblestones in muddy black rivulets. The bodies lay all about the scaffolding which was was thoroughly splashed and steaming with gore and soaked with blood.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">Mordecai felt as if he were trapped in a garish carnival of death as the yells and obscene laughter from the mob that had him pinned rose up around him and seemed to push at him from all sides as walls of sound. Looking out beyond the pushing crowd around him, he could see children at play and women knitting while sharing food and gossip as they watched the sickening display as if it were no more than a colorful show.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">Mordecai shuddered at the memory, even now it made his stomach turn in protest and his chest ache. He quickened his pace as the rain began to come down harder. Mordecai decided he was not just tired of being away from home, he was sick of Paris, sick of France, and sick of living in a world that seemed to have gone utterly insane.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">He reminded himself as he plotted through the storm, that his work in the city was nearly done and he would be back on a ship to America soon. France had recently opened her West Indian ports to neutral traders, since England skippers and shipowners had practically swept the French ships from the sea and the country was now becoming desperate for imports. Skippers and shipowners from New England had quickly stepped in to take advantage of this burgeoning market, and Mordecai Gold had proven himself to be a talented merchant. </p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">His family, what little remained of it, had immigrated to America from Scotland when he was a child. His mother had runoff not long after he was born, and his father had runoff shortly there after. He had been raised by two matron aunts who had provided him with all the love and comfort he had needed. And though life had been hard for them and money had been tight, they had gotten by. But as he reached adulthood he decided that he wanted more for himself and for the family he hoped to one day grow. So he had saved up, educated himself, and began to mold himself into a businessman who would be respected.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body"> He had started with nothing and now he found himself at the head of a fleet of three ships. He was in Paris now bargaining with shippers, supervising return loads, and seeing that prompt payments were made in good hard louis and not in paper assignats. His hard work thus far had led to a steadily increasing fortune, one that allowed his now aged aunts to live comfortably, and one that could assure him that his children would never know the pain and suffering he had known in childhood. His children would always go to bed with full tummies and would never want for warm clothes.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">Through the whistling of the wind and the rushing sound of the rain he heard a shrill cry and a quavering voice, “Au secours, pour l’amour de Dieu-“ The screamed plea was cut off shortly with a gagging sound, as if the speaker were being throttled. Mordecai looked up, cupping his hands to shield his eyes from the rain. About a hundred feet away he could see two blurred figures struggling to pull a sack over a third and hoist them up like a sack of potatoes.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">Many in Paris chose to arm themselves with sword, knife, or pistol; but Mordecai preferred the “executive authority” afforded him by his loaded blackthorn walking stick that happened to be two inches thick, three feet long, and secured to his wrist by a thong of rawhide.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body"> “Halte-là!” Mordecai shouted as commanding as he could as he charged against the figures ahead of him. “What goes on here?”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">The two men counter charged him, dropping their prey in the process. One went to the right and the other to the left; one advancing with a cutlas and one with a wicked looking dirk.</p><p class="Body">The swordsman attempted a hacking blow to Mordecai’s shoulder, but Mordecai was no amateur with either quarterstaff or the sword, so as the cutlas descended he managed to dodge and swing back his stick hitting the poorly tempered blade midway between the point and hilt, snapping it in half as if it were no more than an icicle. The loaded stick swung again, and the swordsman dropped to the stony ground as blood began to stream from his ears and nostrils.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">The other assailant grabbed Mordecai from behind. An arm around his neck caught him off guard and in a split second he saw the glint of the wicked dirk and then felt a blow above his heart that nearly knocked all the air from his lungs. The blow would surely have killed him if not for the great care his Aunt Esther took for his spiritual well-fare, for the dirk’s needle-point had surely been driven by the hand of a skilled assassin. But the point had met its match in the volume of religious exercises, “Gems of Devotional Poetry for Occasional and Daily Use by Japheth Lewenberg, M.A.,” that his Aunt Esther had made him promise he would keep with him always as he stayed in what she considered the Gomorrah of the modern world. And so it was that his promise persuaded him to carry the one hundred and twelve page, bound in full Morocco leather volume of atrocious verse in his breast pocket, a forethought he was now extremely thankful for.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">With a quick stamp on his assailant’s instep, Mordecai gained the upper hand by reaching behind his neck and grappling with the scoundrel. Mordecai had grown up around the young roughs of the waterfront of his childhood home and he knew every hold, fair and unfair, and thus his would be assassin found himself catapulted to the pavement with a force that sent him slithering like a snake across the wet brick street and crashing into a wall with a thud leaving him as broken-headed and inert as his compatriot.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">“Citizen, are you unhurt?” Mordecai asked as he returned to the shivering mass in the rough sack. At his question the sopping wet sack covered mass began to move like a sluggish crocodile in its attempts to shake off the cloth. At last a pale face peered up at him with brilliant blue eyes. “They are gone, Citizen?”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">Mordecai could now see and hear from the girlish voice that the accosted person before him was a petite woman. The woman shook off the rest of the sack and stood unassisted.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">“You needn’t make yourself anxious for me. I am well.” Her voice still quavered slightly as she looked up at him through dripping chestnut curls, and at the sight of her Mordecai momentarily forgot how to breathe.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">The woman giggled through her shivering, “ We are a sorry looking pair Mon-, Citizen. You are as wet as a drowned rat. Please come with me and dry yourself. My house is not so far away.”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">Mordecai bowed stiffly, but with as much dignity as he could muster being soaking wet and having been giggled at by the damsel in distress he had just valiantly saved. “I shall take no illness from my wetting, Citizeness, but perhaps it were as well I walked with you. You may meet with other ruffians on the street and find help less conveniently near.”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">The lovely woman pursed her lips and hummed as if he were no more than a harmless puppy barking at the wind. As he offered her no response to this, she tucked her small hand in the crook of his elbow and fell in step with him as demurely as any high born woman might.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">They hurried along a little ways and came to a halt before an old gate of a walled garden. The petite woman fished a key from the silken drawstring bag dangling from her wrist.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body"> “Entrez vous s’il vous plait, et soyez le bienvenu.” She pinched her dripping skirts between her fingers and lifting them up slightly she gave him a small dip of a curtsy.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">Mordecai hesitated for but a moment before acknowledging her invitation with a small bow of his own.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">They then made their way up a small path to the white door of a small cottage home and she raised her small hand to knock upon it. Waiting a moment, she knocked again.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body"> From within the abode they could here a shuffling step, then the door opened to a candle’s glow and two squinting eyes set in a round, gentle looking wrinkled face.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">“Ma chérie, ma pauvre, ma petite!” croaked the aged portress. “Grace à Dieu, you have returned! I feared you had been lost, drowned in the storm, or... that <em>they</em> had come upon you.”</p><p class="Body">           </p><p class="Body">“Shh, Madam Samovar, not so loud!” the woman bade softly, “Go and light the fire and brew some chocolate for the Citizen. He is wet to the bones.”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">They made their way into the tiny drawing-room where Madam Samovar began to set a fire to glowing in the fireplace and then lit candles in the wall sconces and placed a lit candle on the table before leaving Mordecai to himself while she busied herself with the chocolate.</p><p class="Body">           </p><p class="Body">Mordecai stood before the fire and warmed his hands before the cheerful glow. He looked about the sparse space, eyes settling on a small table with books stacked upon it. Homer’s Odyssey, Virgil’s Aeneid, the plays of Aristophanes, the comedies of Beaumarchais, Voltaire’s Candide, Gulliver’s Travels ...</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">“Pardonnez-moi, Monsieur—I mean Citizen, I hope I have not kept you waiting overlong,”.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">Mordecai heard her voice coming from the doorway and turned to look upon her. Her skin seemed to glow in the firelight, he took a half-step forward and involuntarily drew in his breath. Somehow she looked unlike the other French women he had seen about the city. </p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">She had fair skin, and chestnut hair, curls cascading about her face with the majority piled in a Psyche-knot at the back. Her face boasted high cheek-bones and generous lips, and eyes the most brilliant blue. Unusual eyes... large and heavy-fringed, passionate and pleading even as she smiled demurely.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">She walked gracefully toward him with a slim hand extended, “Mon sauveur.” Her voice was softly husky and he reflexively licked his lips at the sound of it. “Bienfaiteur. To you I owe a debt I cannot ever pay.”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">Mordecai took her little hand in his and raised it to his lips pressing a small kiss upon it. He took a step back and took in the sight of her. Her gown draped loosely from a high waist, sheer and clinging as it followed her every curve. She wore a pale blue sash of ribbon just below her bosom and trailing with fringed ends almost to the hem of her dress at the back.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body"> As she moved he saw in glimpses that her feet were without stockings and shod in dainty sandals fastened with cross-straps of pale blue ribbon about her ankles. At the sight of her dainty feet Mordecai’s thoughts drifted to a stanza from the Song of Songs: “How beautiful are thy feet with shoes, O prince’s daughter!”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">Madam Samovar returned with steaming cups of chocolate and a plate of biscuits. His lovely damsel handed him a cup.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">“You are not Parisian? Your accent...”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">“No, Mademoiselle—“</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">“We no longer say ‘Monsieur’, ‘Madam’, or ‘Mademoiselle’ now. The Convention has decreed that we are but citizens and nothing more.”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">“I am American, <em>Mademoiselle.</em>”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">“That is a relief, I had thought perhaps you were a cidevant...” she stopped abruptly, as if frightened by the word itself. But then her smile returned. “But no, you rescued me from them.”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">Mordecai’s brows drew together as he frowned thoughtfully. “Them? Who were they?”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">“They were agents of General Security.” Her face fell and she looked remorsefully at him as if to say ‘aren’t you sorry you interfered now’.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">“Oh, so they were Robespierre’s bullies? Well, I don’t think that those particular two will bother you again.”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">A thundering knock came at the door. “Open in the name of the Republic!”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">His damsel went pale at the declaration and bit her knuckle as if to stifle a scream. “They have traced me. I am found...”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">“Shh, Mademoiselle!” Mordecai was on his feet and quickly blowing out the candles; he was sure that no light made it through the heavy draperies to the outside, but he wanted only darkness when he went to the door.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">She grabbed at his arm. “Monsieur, you must not go! They will take you to the Tribunal, the chopper...”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">He placed a gentle hand on her cheek. “Remain here. I will outpace them.”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">He noisily stamped to the door. “Well?” He challenged as he flung the door open. “What is this annoyance, Citizens? Can a man no longer sleep quietly in his home?”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">The portly commissarie of police and his ragged looking pikemen gaped as Mordecai glared at them. His authoritative stance, the tan of sun at sea, and his uncompromising manner was not what they had expected.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">“Your pardon, Citizen, but we are looking for the citizeness Belle Louvegny, ci-devant comtesse d’Aules—“</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">Mordecai cut them off, “And you imagine her to be in my house?” He gave them a chiding laugh. “I am Mordecai Gold, of Goldworth shipping of Massachusetts. You would seek cocottes in my home?”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">The guardsmen stepped back and whispered among themselves, “Un Américain, un bas bleu!”</p><p class="Body">The commissarie shifted uneasily. “The Citizen has his passport?”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">Many considered the American shippers to be savages from across the sea. Worldly men who were cold and ready with the fist.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">Mordecai drew his laissez-passer from his pocket and held it out in his left hand, while still gripping his blackthorn stick in his right.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">There was very little light to read by and the commissarie seemed to struggle.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">“Come, come! I have just arrived home wet to the skin and I want to dry myself before the fire.”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">“Your pardon, Citizen.” He returned Mordecai’s passport. “And there is no one else in the house?”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">“None but my elderly servant and my wife.” And with that said he slammed the door shut.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">Mordecai returned to the other room and took Belle’s shaking hands in his own. “They are gone Mademoiselle.”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">Her lip quivered and her eyes seemed unfocused.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">“They are gone, I sent them off. You are safe.”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">“But they will return, Monsieur. They won’t give up searching with Gaston to urge them on...”</p><p class="Body">She paused and her eyes seemed to grow large. “Do you think you truly killed him?”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">“Who?”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">“Gaston Henriot, the man with the sword.”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">“I think I did. If not, then he is surely suffering.”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">Belle sighed, “But if he is not dead, then we are undone. He has stalked me since I left Pont l’Evêque.”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">Mordecai led Belle to a chair and placed her forgotten cup of chocolate back in her hands. “How did you come to know this fellow?”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">“My father was the Comte d’Aules. He was a poor, but honorable gentleman. He farmed our estate himself. He never looked down on manual labor and believed as firmly in the Social contract of Rousseau as he believed in heaven. One of the workers on my father’s farm had been Gaston Henriot. He was a farrier and a stable man. He’s about my age and we had played together as children. He was high spirited, but prone to long periods of a black mood.” Belle stared into her cup, “He tried to drown himself once. I think he would’ve succeeded if I hadn’t screamed for help at the sight.”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">“Later, he decided that becoming a farrier was beneath him and expressed a desire to become a notary. My father had him sent to Caen to study law and was paying for his expenses. I went away to take lessons at the convent for a few years and when I returned I found him shoeing horses. Apparently he couldn’t make a go of being a notary’s apprentice.”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">“No one wanted to be near him for when he wasn’t sullen he was drunk, or inciting revolts and riots.”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">“I made the mistake of being kind to him, talking with him, and he mistook that pity for lust. He asked to marry me and I declined, so he went to my father. But my father also declined. Gaston flew into a rage then and vowed that one day he would bring me to my knees and have me beg to marry him only to spurn me.”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">“He came to Paris and became an agent of General Security. He denounced my father to the Tribunal and had him dragged away to the chopper without a trial. I hadn’t even known that he had been taken until I heard the street urchins yelling the names of those who had drawn prizes in the lottery of Madame Guillotine.”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">Belle began to cry then. “What was I to do? To return home would be certain death, not that there was a home to return to as it had been burnt to ashes. I cannot run for I no longer have lassiz-passer and traveling without one is certain death. Madam Samovar had this little house, she was nursemaid to me as a child, my mother having died when I was young. She hides me here and I try not to go out of doors in day, only venturing out in the evening when the sun has set. But tonight I had barely walked a hundred feet when I sensed I was being followed. I broke into a run, but they were upon me in no time. Gaston was the one who grabbed me first. His voice alone made me ill. He said, “Bon soir Mademoiselle la Comtesse, it has been a long time. Whom do you take for your husband now? Me or the chopper?”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">I was so terrified I couldn’t bring myself to answer, and my silence seemed to drive him into a frenzy. I screamed for help and God sent me you.”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">She inhaled sharply, “But now I can no longer stay here. They will hunt me down. I must find somewhere to hide, but where?”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">Mordecai knelt before her. “I do not think you need be so afraid. Gaston accosted you on the street which would indicate he did not know the house you came from. If he is still alive, the thump I gave him will lay him up for a long time. The commissarie was probably canvassing all of the houses on this street and I assured him I lived here, and…”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">Mordecai was silent long enough for Belle to prompt him. “Monsieur?”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">“I told him I lived here with my elderly servant and wife since I knew that people in the neighborhood will have seen Madam Samovar and perhaps you leaving the house.”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">“But your lie will be discovered—“</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">Mordecai cut her off with a gentle voice, “It need not be. I can pack a few belongings in portmanteau and move them here in a short time. My lodgings are not far away, but I can live here, thereby giving the illusion that this house is mine, Samovar my servant, and you…”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">He stopped mid sentence at the stricken look in her eyes. She had not moved or changed her expression, but it seemed to him that he could almost see her soul retreating in panic-footed terror behind her eyes.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">“What I mean—-“ he began but stopped as she drew in a shuddering breath and released it in a pitiful sigh, looking for all the world as a victim led to sacrifice. She bowed her head submissively, “You have saved my life, Monsieur. It is yours to do with as you please. I accept your proposition.”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">His cheeks went red. “What?! You mean…you thought that I would be so base as to—“</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">“What else is there to think Monsieur?”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">“Woman,” his voice sounded brittle, “I am offering you protection, not asking an exchange—“</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">“Oh! You mean that you would live here in this house of mine as if you were my frère de lait, my foster brother, like children playing house?”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">Mordecai smiled at the look of joy upon her face like a rainbow after a storm. “Precisely, like children playing house.”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">“Then you must hurry Monsieur. Go and bring your things to this playhouse of ours.”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">He made his way to the door, and Belle swept him a deep curtsy on the threshold “Return all soon… Oh! I do not even know your name.”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">“Mordecai Gold.”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">“Return to me Mordecai Gold.”</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. Playing House</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p class="Body">The rain had stopped by the time he left his lodgings and made his way back to the little home on the Street of the Windows. His heart seemed to rise in his chest the nearer he drew. What would Aunt Esther and Aunt Miriam think of all of this? Surely they would understand and approve of what he is doing. What was the lovely French woman’s name? Belle? Belle. The more he repeated it the better he liked it, and he repeated it so much that it kept time with the stepping of his feet.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">A month quickly went by of living with Belle “like children playing house” and it had been one of the most pleasant months of his life. She was such a happy little creature, oddly mature sometimes, and childlike the next.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">For the first few days it had been “bon jour Monsieur” when he left for work in the morning and ‘enchantée de vous revoir’ when he came back at night. Now it was a happy ‘à bientot’ when he left and an even happier ‘bienvenu!’ At his return. By the end of the first week she had begun to turn her face up to be kissed when he returned home. Now the rite was preformed three times daily; at his departure, his return, and just before she bade him “bonne nuit,” and the flicker of her little feet whisked her off to bed.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">Tonight was their ‘anniversary’, as she had been Madame Gold for a whole month. In honor of the occasion she had put on her best clothes and to Mordecai’s eyes he had never seen a more beautiful woman. Her gown was white muslin gathered in close knife-pleats running vertically from bosom to hem. It was cut with a round neck-line, low in front and back, with puff sleeves at the shoulders. Tightly fitted at the bust with a high-set waist defined by a long, sweeping sash of deep blue tied at the back in a bow whose end nearly draped to the floor. She wore shoes reminiscent of a ballet dancer’s laced with deep blue ribbons in a lattice through which her pale feet seemed to gleam seductively.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">They had shared a white wine at dinner to celebrate that was tart to the point of acidness, but Belle didn’t complain. She sighed and remarked, “This year’s vintage is a bitter one for France, but there will be other years and other vintages. The sun must shine again.”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">After dinner, they sat together on the small couch.</p><p class="Body"> “It has been pretty this month, has it not my Mordecai?” Her voice was small, nearly a whisper as she tucked one foot up under her and begun to swing the other to and fro as if to tease the firelight coming from the hearth before them.  “It has been a garden filled with fragrant flowers, the memory of it will perfume my life hereafter. But… my Mordecai…” She sighed.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">“Why do you sigh Belle?”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">“I did but think.”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">“Of what?”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">“Of how sweet it must be to be truly wed to some one like thee, my Mordecai.”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">Mordecai’s breath came so fast he nearly passed out. His heart seemed to want to burst forth from his chest. “Belle,” he whispered, the effort nearly more than he could bare, “you love me, Belle?”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">She turned to face him, face full of longing and lips moist and dewy, “More than I can tell, mon adoré!”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">Warm and tender, her arms wrapped around him and he could feel the tears from her eyes on his cheek. He turned his head and drew her to him, kissing her slowly, bending her head back against the sofa-arm. She seemed to melt in his arms before tightening her arms around his neck again and drawing him down to her wanting lips.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">Later they sat together in each other’s arms listening to the crackle of the fire before them. Mordecai whispered against her hair, “We must be married very soon my dear. Tomorrow, if possible. I will go to the Mairie on my way to the bureau—“</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">Belle turned her head and spoke in a distressed whisper against his chest, “You cannot! We cannot! Consider, I am ci-deviant comtesse d’Aules. My father was beheaded on the guillotine, I myself am hors la loi, outside the law. They give us cidevants no trial at the Tribunal. There is no birth certificate or baptismal record for me that you can give them, you dare not even tell them who I am!”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">“But when we’re married you will be a citizen of the United States—“</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">“But until that time I am a citizeness of France and subject to her laws. They will not let you snatch me from them and cheat the chopper.”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">“I have it! My ship the Deborah will be at Le Havre within the week. I’ll send a message to the captain and have him bring her up the Seine. We can go to her in a closed coach and once you are aboard her I’ll defy the whole garde nationale to take you off again. When we are out of cannon-shot of land I’ll have the captain marry us. You shall go home with me, ma petite Belle, home to Massachusetts as Madame Gold.”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">They sat there for a long time, holding each other. There was no need for words between them, for it was enough to know that they were deeply and wonderingly in love.</p><p class="Body"> </p>
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<a name="section0003"><h2>3. In the Shadows</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p class="Body">At last the day they had been waiting for had come. The Deborah would be coming up the Seine. Belle couldn’t help but smile all day long despite the gloominess of the day. The day had been grey, the air thick and heavy with occasional streaks of lightning. All of her and Mordecai’s belongings had been carefully packed and taken to his office at the bureau slowly over the last week and would be taken today to meet the ship. This would be her last night in France.  </p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">As the sun began to set, Belle set off to buy a few things to bring with her on to the ship. She purchased some perfume, lavender soap, and some thread and needles so as to mend their clothes if need be on the trip. The shop was not far from home, but she never the less hurried on her way.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">The twilight of the day seemed menacing somehow, casting a brassy glow that seemed to give her surroundings an unreal quality. Still she smiled as she focused on the fact that come the morning she would be on her way to freedom with her husband by her side. Husband… her heart fluttered happily at the thought. Suddenly she heard a rustle behind her sending a chill of fear up her spine. She quickened her pace almost to a run for a short while and hearing no more rustling she slowed and chastised herself for acting like a scared child.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">The last light of sunset dimmed and Belle suddenly found herself on a street filled with shadows. She heard a shuffling sound behind her and seemed to see a darkened shape before her. She broke into a run and to her terror she saw vague shapes obscured by long cloaks come at her from multiple directions.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">“Do you have her? Ha!”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">The voice was harsh to Belle’s ears, but she still recognized it as Gaston’s.</p><p class="Body">A dark lantern was held aloft and the blind snapped open. It’s light shone on Gaston’s face and Belle couldn’t help but shudder at the change she saw there. His once handsome but dark humored face was now twisted and deformed. One side of his face seemed to be melting and drooped down, his lips seemed to be twisted into a perpetual sneering grin, teeth exposed and drool dripping from the corner. As he stood before her it seemed as if his spine were twisted and bent and one hand seemed to curl in on itself painfully, and one of his legs was splinted and the foot turned at the ankle.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">He spoke with a painful sounding, slobbering lisp. “Bon soir, Mademoiselle la Comtesse. This time you will not cheat the chopper. At last I have you in my net my little dove. There will be no last minute rescue from your American this time.”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">Belle felt as if her throat were closing off. There was a loud ringing in her ears. She felt as though her heart were ripping itself apart. He had said her American would not save her.</p><p class="Body">Her Mordecai! What had he done to him? She felt as if the world around her was being pulled away, leaving her falling into an endless darkness.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">One of Gaston’s henchmen caught Belle as she collapsed. “She’s fainted.”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">Gaston seemed to growl, “Bring her out of it then. Thrust a pin in her!”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">The gang of men looked about themselves and found a pin. Belle felt a piercing pain in her thigh as the sharp pin was pushed into her, but to her horror she found herself frozen. She seemed unable to move or even whimper.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">The man with the pin withdrew it. “Mon commissaire, I think she has suffered apoplexy.”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">She could feel her eyelids being drawn back, but couldn’t see any light. Then she felt a cold hand grab her wrist.  “B’en oui, elle est morte.”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">She heard Gaston shout, “Give me the candle!” Then she felt her left shoe being pulled off and then a blistering, searing pain on the bottom of her toes. Still she found she could not make a sound or even flinch. She seemed utterly trapped in this cage of torturous darkness.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">“Vraiment, elle est morte.” It was Gaston’s voice again, but it was softer now. “My Belle, I am sorry. I would have seen you to the chopper, but only because I loved you so. You were so beautiful, so far above me. If I could not have you then I would let no other have you.”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">One of Gaston’s men remarked, “Eh bien, the chopper has been cheated. The trench at the cimetière de la Madeleine is still open, and only twelve were chopped today—“</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">“Non!” Gaston cut the man off. “I will not have her buried in the common fosse. Have a three-year concession opened.”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">“The citizen commissaire forgets that graves cost money. Who will pay for the concession?”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">Gaston roughly shoved a wad of assignats into the man’s hand. “You two help him and see that it gets done. You others come with me. We have more arrests to make.”</p><p class="Body"> </p>
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<a name="section0004"><h2>4. Keeping his promise</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p class="Body">Mordecai finished packing up his and Belle’s things at his bureau and sent them off to the ship, and began the walk to the home he had been sharing with Belle. Belle. His heart now seemed to beat out her name. Never had he dared dream that he could have someone as wonderful and beautiful as Belle.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">As he neared the Street of the Windows he heard Madam Samovar calling out to him.</p><p class="Body">“Mordecai, pour l’amour de Dieu, come!”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">Mordecai sprinted toward her and ushered her into the house. He then grounded her with his hands upon her shoulders. “What has happened?”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">“They have taken her! La petite is dead!”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">Mordecai could not believe what he was hearing, “You mean Belle has been arrested—“</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">“She is dead! I have seen her corpse!”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">Mordecai’s knees buckled and he collapsed to the floor. “No…”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">Mordecai’s voice was but a whisper, “When—How?”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">Madam Samovar sat beside him, “She went to the shop down the way to make some little purchases at sunset. I begged her not to go, But she was not worried, for we have had no trouble since you have been with us. When the time came to light the candles and she had not yet returned, I became worried so I went out looking for her. I had barely left the house when I saw her lying on the street surrounded by guardsmen. They didn’t notice me as I came closer and hid behind a tree.” Her voice began to waver as she continued, “there lay my little lamb, my baby, dead on the ground! That Gaston, may Satan himself flay him, had her taken off to be put in a three-year concession, she who is a noble beloved dame to lie in a pauper’s grave! It would have been better had he left her to the fosse—“</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">“Are you sure that she is dead, perhaps she just fainted?”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">Madam Samovar shook her head, “Too sure, I saw them feel for her pulse and flash a light in her eyes, and they burned her little foot with fire. Oh my little one, my duckling is dead!” She began to keen and lay down upon her side on the floor. She gasped for breath. Mordecai rubbed her back in comfort, but she began to spasm and then fell still, her eyes glazed and her jaw flaccid. Mordecai examined the elderly woman and found her dead. A broken heart he supposed, for his own certainly was.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">Mordecai sat upon the floor in silence staring off at nothing. Not that there was much to see by the light of the few candles that had been lit. What would be the point of lighting more? Light? There would be no light in his life now. No stars, no sun… He tried to understand all that he had been told. Belle, his wonderful little Belle is dead in a pauper’s grave. Never again would he hear her laughing voice, or feel her touch, never again would he see her face…</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">“No!”  He shouted and got to his feet. He pulled his cloak about him and went out on to the street. “Adieu poor Madam Samovar. I am going to Belle.” He sent up a promise to the universe ‘I will not break my promise to you Belle. You shall go home with me my beloved.”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">She had been put in a three-year grave Madam Samovar had said, so the grave will be shallow. He should have no problem getting to the flimsy coffin. He would tear it apart with his hands if he had to and then he would take her body back with him to the Deborah. He could keep her body in a cask of rum until they reached Massachusetts and then he’d have her laid in a plot on the land he had purchased to live on. Somewhere beautiful and peaceful.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">The storm that had threatened the city all day finally broke and Mordecai could not help but find it fitting for it had been raining when he met her, so why not now?</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">Tears streamed down his face silently as his mind brought forth little snapshots of memory of her. He remembered how her little feet had made him think of the Song of Songs, he thought of it again, particularly the line ‘Love is strong as death’. He repeated that line to himself as a mantra as he speeded toward the cemetery of the Madeleine. He passed the Place de la Revolution as a strike of lightening illuminated the ghastly silhouette of the dreaded chopper. He turned right as rain began to come down in torrents, but he strode though it as if it were no more than a drizzle.</p><p class="Body"> </p>
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<a name="section0005"><h2>5. Trapped</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p class="Body">Belle had felt them place her in the coffin though she still couldn’t see or make her body move. She tried with all the effort she could muster to scream, whimper, move, something to show them that she was still alive. She felt as if she were lost in her own mind and she felt more terrified than she knew was humanely possible. She had been afraid for so long of being caught and taken to the guillotine. The image of being strapped down to the plank, the sight of the blood soaked basket waiting for her head. The thought had given her nightmares. But this…being lost in this endless blackness, being nailed shut in a coffin and buried alive…to suffocate slowly.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">The banging of the nails being driven in, the jarring thump as the coffin she was in came to rest in the grave, and the deafening shocks as dirt came roaring down upon the coffin’s lid. Belle was screaming in horror within her own mind and as her horror overwhelmed her, light seemed to flash in her eyes and she lost consciousness completely.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">When her consciousness returned she found that she was mistress of her body once more. Her movements were stiff and apprehensive as she reached out and felt her wooden confines. She whimpered.  She could finally call out for help, for all the good it would do her.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">She began to tremble as a sort of madness overtook her thoughts. She shrieked and wailed, she kicked and pounded to no avail. Her confines were so small that she could not bring her hands to her face, a fact that so unsettled her that she began to claw at the fabric of her gown and began to bite her tongue and split her lips with her screaming and shouting causing blood to pool in her mouth and splatter onto her chest. She hit her head upon the lid of the coffin and fell back as her head ached. She took a deep breath and with the last of her energy she drew up her knees as much as she could and kicked up with all her might. She felt the lid give a bit and thought perhaps she felt some air rush in. A wave of weakness overcame her, but she held on. To hope that perhaps she had bought herself some time to try again.</p>
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<a name="section0006"><h2>6. The escape</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p class="Body">By the time Mordecai reached the cemetery the deluge had finally stopped. He hammered on the sexton’s door beside the gate. Finally the door opened slightly. “You must be lost Citizen.”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">Mordecai pushed the door open forcefully. “Would citizen sexton like to make 500 francs?”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">The sexton squinted his eyes, “Are you drunk citizen?”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">Mordecai shook a stack of assignats in front of the sexton. “Regard me well. Three hundred now and another three hundred when you’ve done what I ask.”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">“Do you want me to kill someone or do you have a body you want disposed of?”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">“I want for you to consult your records. Sometime after sunset a woman’s body was brought here.”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">“The chopper has been very busy-“</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">“This one was not chopped, and was put in a three-year grave.”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">“I remember her.”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">“I want her disinterred.”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">The sexton raised his eyebrows, “Are you a resurrectionist or anatomist?”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">Mordecai waved the money in the man’s face again. “Will you help or not?”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">The man snatched the money and then grabbed his shovel and pick-ax. “Follow me.”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">They made their way down a gravel path and across a muddy red stained gash known as the fosse, the ditch where victims of the dreaded guillotine are unceremoniously discarded. Ahead of them he could see the ransacked remains of the marble tombs which once housed the bones of the wealthy, now in disrepair. Farther off he could see the freshly buried mounds of the ten-year graves with their simple wooden markers bereft of any religious emblems for they had been outlawed for all citizens living and dead. And there, by the cemetery wall he saw the five-year graves, a collection of coffins buried a mere three to four feet deep, and in a section beside them, the three year graves where rough hewn coffins were buried a mere two feet deep. In a short three years they would be emptied and the bodies thrown in the cemetery’s common charnel-house.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">The sexton approached one of the mounds and shone his lantern upon the muddy mound. “Grand Dieu!”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">There face down upon the mound, arms spread as if to embrace the grave lay a man. The cockade in his hat and his tri-colored sash indicated he was an agent of Public Security. He still held a pistol in his hand and a bullet wound to the side of his head revealed his cause of death.  The sexton huffed, “Un suicide. Eh bien, he chose a fitting place for it.” The man rolled the body to the side with a kick of his foot and a push of his spade.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">The dead man’s face revealed, Mordecai recognized him as the man who had tried to take Belle. Gaston Henriot.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">The sexton turned to Mordecai and held out the lantern. “Shall we begin?”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">Mordecai took the lantern and the sexton began to fling muddy clods with his rusty spade, and in a matter of minutes he had the coffin laid bare and was prying up the lid with the pickax.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">As the lid was wrenched away Mordecai leaned forward allowing the lantern light to shine within the coffin.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">Belle lay rigid within, her bruised and bloody hands gripping the fabric at her waist and blood upon her lips and chin.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">“Dieu nous sauve! Come away Citizen, it is a Vampire!” The sexton was shaking, but he didn’t run. “Stand back Citizen, let me deal with it. I will sever the head with my spade.”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">“Non, non!” Cried Mordecai as he saw the sexton raise his spade. He waved the man off and knelt over the coffin and whispered, “Belle, my sweet little Belle, did they do this to you?”</p><p class="Body">Mordecai reached in and cupped her cheek feeling that it was warm. The sexton tried to pull him away and Mordecai pushed him back. The poor sexton landed on his bottom in a pool of muddy water looking for all the world like a nervous elderly duck.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">The sexton cried out, “Come away quickly!”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">But Mordecai ignored him instead reaching in to feel of Belle’s neck and to his wonder and fear he felt a feeble heart beat there reminiscent of the faint fluttering of a fledgling who has fallen from its nest and is suffering from exposure.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">“Here.” Mordecai tossed a fistful of assignats at the sexton, “Close this grave and speak not of this night.”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">Mordecai hoisted Belle out of the grave and wrapped her in his cloak before swiftly carrying her out of the cemetery.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">He entered the dark alleyway behind the cemetery and could see a patch of illumination from a lantern hanging on the side of a house on the cross street. As Mordecai made his way through the dark alley he stopped when he saw a tabby cat dart out from the dark alley wall. The cat paused mid-step looking toward the crossroad at the end of the alley for a moment before slinking back to where it had come. Mordecai had always trusted the instinct of animals and if the cat distrusted what lie ahead than so did he. Sure enough he heard the rhythmic footfalls of the night patrol on their rounds.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">Mordecai knew he couldn’t run, for that would immediately alert them. He would have to pass them by. He took a calming breath and then swung Belle down from his shoulder and held her as best he could under one arm while still shielding her with his cloak. He then staggered confidently along singing in as best a slurring French imitation that he could:</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">            “La vie set brève,—hic</p><p class="Body">            Un peu d’espoir,</p><p class="Body">            Un peu de rêve,—hic</p><p class="Body">            Et puis—bon soir!” Hic</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">The hiccups were a masterpiece of inebriety, and indeed he actually did have the hiccups by the end of the song, to his dismay but it added well to his ruse.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">The brigadier commanding the patrol chuckled sympathetically. He himself had often enjoyed an evening in the wine shops guzzling good red wine. In fact he felt a bit jealous of the drunkard in a good natured way as he wished he could be drunk rather than slogging through dark stinking alleys.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">“Hé Citizen, you would best go home and sleep it off. Mon Dieu, you are drunk like a pig, lucky man!”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">Mordecai stumbled on and to his relief the night patrol left down another street. To his further relief, the streets were empty at this time of night. The wind was damp and chilling to him, but he focused on his breathing and continued his stride toward the river.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">The wharves soon came into view with their brackish water and the varied scents of the cargoes of the ships docked there. The ships’ masts and yard-arms cut the view of the sky at odd angles. The sounds of the harbor echoed; the skittering of rats, the grinding of the wooden boats against the dock, the odd creak, and the splashes of the moving water.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">Belle stirred against his shoulder and whimpered. “Safe sweetheart. You’re safe now, I’m with you.”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">At last he came to his ship. The sailor who was posted at guard immediately recognized him. “Master Mordecai! The Cap told me to expect you. Welcome aboard.”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">The sailor yelled up the gangway for the captain as Mordecai still holding Belle securely made his way on board.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">Belle awoke fully as Mordecai sat her upon a cot. “Mordecai! My beloved are we dead?”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">Mordecai cried in relief and caressed her face, “No my Belle. I pulled you out of the earth and brought you to The Deborah. We are safe my love.”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">Belle clung to him and sobbed in relief, “It was horrific! I didn’t know it was possible to be so terrified!” Mordecai held her close and comforted her. “But we are safe now, we three.”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">Mordecai sighed sadly, “Belle, Madam Samovar… when she thought you had died…”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">Belle nodded, somehow knowing what he was about to say. Her lips wibbled, but she didn’t cry. Perhaps she was momentarily out of tears.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">Mordecai called for warm water and very gentlemanly held up a sheet so that she may bathe and dress. As Belle undressed she felt her purchases of the evening still in her hidden pocket and marveled that they were still intact. It seemed like an eternity ago now…</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">She washed up with the lavender soap and breathed deeply of its scent, letting it calm her.</p><p class="Body">When she was finished and dressed, Mordecai saw to all of her wounds and bandaged them carefully.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">Despite being safe aboard The Deborah and on their way to the Americas, Belle still felt at unease; as if at any moment the lovely future that she imagined was almost within grabbing distance would be snatched away from her. Mordecai seemed to be of the same mind because while they waited for a meal to be made for them he suddenly stood and suggested that they be married that moment for he couldn’t bear to fall asleep not knowing they were legal wed.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">“You do not think we may yet be stopped…” Belle shivered at the thought. Mordecai calmed her with his hands on her shoulders,  “no mon petit Belle, but I would feel better if I knew that in the eyes of all you and I are married and that France no longer has any claim to you.”</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body">Belle smiled and held out her hands for him to help her up, but knowing that her foot was injured Mordecai lifted her into his arms and within the next few moments they were married by the captain of the ship and all aboard were willing and prepared to swear to the union.</p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body"> </p><p class="Body"> </p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>I see this as the end of this tale, but I’m open to continuing it if you the readers would like. If you want more of Belle and Mordecai feel free to send a prompt.</p>
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